The Chairman's Corner

By John Chipman, Jr.

November 2021

Where are all the long-haul drivers? Perhaps they’re inside a 40-footer on a container ship waiting to be off-loaded at the Port of Long Beach, along with all our Christmas toys? Or, the drivers are stored in an old vault in your warehouse. The forgotten “dunnage” vault is buried five tiers back in a three-high row, and jammed packed with dog eared Thomas Guides, dusty IBM Wheelwriters, a dead beeper, and a pack of cherry flavored Swisher Sweets. If finding drivers in California were a game of hide-n-seek, our industry would be hollering: “Olly olly oxen free!” all over the neighborhood.

National Shortage. California Movers are facing an acute driver shortage. “Acute” is a fancy way of saying unless we find more drivers our companies will be performing APUs, Pack & Crates and G-11s ad nauseam, or at least until there’s not a square inch of floor space left at your warehouse during Peak Season. California Movers aren’t alone in this regard. According to Chris Spear, President and CEO of the American Trucking Association, the entire trucking industry is currently short “80,000 drivers”, a record high.  Truck drivers move “71% of the US economy’s goods”, Chris reports. Lack of drivers isn’t limited to California; misery loves company.

What’s your strategy? What California Movers need is a sound strategy for recruiting new drivers and keeping the good ones. Don’t have a strategy? Then it’s a good thing we have industry experts to advise us.

Driver Recruitment. One way of getting drivers combines the best of the old and the new schools. Tom Oakley, President and CEO of Atlas Transfer & Storage (agent for Allied) in Poway says “word of mouth is still extremely effective”. Drivers love Altas’ “positive work environment” and don’t hesitate to share their experience. Colleen Turner, Dispatcher at Chipman Relocations & Logistics, agrees: “Drivers talk to drivers. They share how they are treated by move coordinators, warehouse crews, and how fairly they are compensated.” To paraphrase Tom and Colleen: happy drivers become your company’s best evangelists for bringing in new drivers.

With respect to the new school: “Technology should be leveraged both in advertising and in making the application process as smooth and user friendly as possible”, according to Jason Jones, UniGroup’s SVP of Human Resources and Safety. (UniGroup is the parent company of United and Mayflower) Jason prefers industry specific job boards: “CDLjobs, JobsInTrucks, AllTruckJobs, SimplyHired, ZipRecruiter and Indeed. Google remains the biggest advertising platform. Facebook is a good source, and LinkedIn is growing, particularly with owner operators”.

RV Life Recruits? Are we looking in the wrong place for potential drivers? Afterall the pandemic created a new nomadic sub-class of Millennials who don’t want to be tethered to a residence or job location. Perfect candidates? We could head to Yellowstone Park and the RKO campgrounds to knock on the doors of recreational vehicles. These folks might be willing to trade in their hamster-powered VW campers for a 2021 Peterbilt with a tricked-out ARI sleeper the size of studio apartment? Just add chrome rims.

Driver Retention. Keeping drivers on your team might be the most challenging part of the strategy. What to do? “In addition to working well together, it’s essential to provide drivers with safe, compliant equipment that looks good, especially to customers and other drivers. Agents must pay on time and in full once the job is complete,” says Tom Oakley. Colleen Turner thinks higher compensation percentages is an important factor in keeping drivers. But, Colleen also believes empathy is critical to retention: “Over the road drivers are sacrificing a lot more than the rest of us. Understanding and helping them navigate their professional and personal challenges creates lasting relationships.”

Drink the PODs Kool-Aid? Not just yet. Our experts aren’t ready to abandon the industry’s traditional long-haul driver model in favor of a 100% containerized approach. Colleen Turner thinks the model just needs to be modified: “We can enhance our model with some containers and flex trailers.” Jason Jones feels that increasing the number of agent pickups and deliveries at residences would also be an improvement: “Creating ‘no-touch’ middle mile lanes would make our existing model more efficient and be driver friendly. Drivers could haul more loads and get home more often.”

Another approach would be to market long-haul drivers as a “white glove service” If priced accordingly with an appropriate level of compensation, the white glove model might be one way to attract new drivers and keep them in our industry.

What’s your driver strategy? Let me know at jchipmanjr@chipmanrelo.com.

November 2021- CMSA Communicator